Stamford schools look to prevent tragedies

Published 8:34 pm, Saturday, December 7, 2013

Joe O'Callahan, the Stamford School District's social services coordinator, speaks about his job at Westhill High School in Stamford, Conn. on Monday November 18, 2013.

Joe O'Callahan, the Stamford School District's social services coordinator, speaks about his job at Westhill High School in Stamford, Conn. on Monday November 18, 2013.

Photo: Dru Nadler

Stamford schools look to prevent tragedies

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STAMFORD -- Things can get better.

It's a simple sentence of four words. It reflects what professionals have to get teens mired in depression to see and it reflects the mission of a city trying to prevent more teen suicides.

"Sometimes what you feel in the moment, feels forever," said Sherry Perlstein, president and chief executive officer of The Child Guidance Center of Southern Connecticut, describing how teens get trapped in depression. She said that's the hardest thing to do, to get someone reeling from depression to understand their feelings of heartbreak won't last forever. It's easier said than done, but it is getting done.

That's a hard story to tell in this community that has been so recently struck by tragedy.

Stamford schools lost two teens to suicide early on in the school year.

Those tragedies have pushed people to ask if the schools and community should be doing more.

More Information

• Stamford Public Schools is planning forums and rolling out other programs to address mental health issues• A Mental Health Summit will be held Dec. 17 in the Government Center to discuss needs in the city.• Mental health is being added to the health curriculum in the schools and will be taught in January and February.• Speakers on the topic are being sought for January and February forums with students and the community.• In January Healthy Minds CT will hold three community discussions in Stamford.

Parents have suggested mental health be taught in health classes. Forums in the district are planned for this month and next.

These are prudent steps to take, officials said.

Perlstein and others say there is more need than ever and that to improve mental health, the work has to take place inside and outside the schools.

To do that, Stamford needs to understand the problem and what can be done about it.

There are 16,069 students in Stamford schools and 4,672 attend one of the three high schools. They are a diverse group with no single race or ethnicity making up more than 36 percent of the population.

Economically, half of Stamford's high school students are considered disadvantaged, according to the most recent enrollment figures for this year.

Those students walking the halls have had a difficult year. Westhill and Stamford highs both have lost students.

Margaret Simpson is a junior at Stamford High and a member of the schools' Mental Health First Aid Team. It's a group of students who received training this summer in how to help students struggling with mental health issues get help.

"Things for a while were very quiet," Simpson said. "People were just emotionally upset and couldn't speak up."

Out of respect for the family, she didn't mention the name of the Stamford High student who died recently.

She said it was a pain felt by many.

"People didn't want to talk to anyone. It was a tragedy that happened to someone that everyone knew."

She said the school's attempt to help the students, by providing counselors for a few days was helpful because it let people know there was someone to talk to.

But getting students to talk about their everyday troubles hasn't been easy, she said.

"It's a lot harder than people think," she said, of approaching someone who is crying or looks like they are having trouble. "They don't want to talk to us. They don't know who we are. They don't want to open up to us. I have seen multiple breakdowns."

The mental health first aid team will meet and discuss their experiences in the next month. They are also going to come up with a campaign to let more students know how to reach out to counselors and other professionals if they are struggling.

"The level of stress, anxiety and depression has gone up over the years," said O'Callahan, who is based in Westhill.

O'Callahan, who several professionals referred to as being on the front lines of efforts to improve mental health in the schools, is in charge of the 34 social workers who are often brought in to try and help students who are struggling with issues.

Like the students, the staff in the schools have been affected by the tragedies.

"They are our kids," O'Callahan said, of the students the district lost. "We want them to be happy, successful people."

O'Callahan said in the 20 years he's been a social worker, stress levels have gone up. He said the kids are feeling it. There is the trouble with bullying with social media. Kids are also under a lot of pressure to succeed. And they're experiencing crises, including the loss of loved ones, like parents. Some have identity issues, some are having children.

He also said since the Sandy Hook and Columbine tragedies, schools react aggressively to threats of violence and social workers deal with those cases, too.

It is a collaborative effort that includes teachers, psychologists and outside counseling agencies, he said. It has to be.

The social workers aren't dedicated to dealing with students who have mental health issues. They also have full case loads involving special education students, he said.

If there was one thing he'd like to see in the district is to provide some dedicated staff to mental health work and prevention.

O'Callahan like other professionals said the whole community needs to get involved in this issue. People need to reach out to the students and the professionals who can help them because the school isn't designed to handle the problem by itself.

Perlstein, the CEO, said the need for this kind of service has grown dramatically over the years and especially following the tragedy in Sandy Hook.

Her group is called in by the schools for emergency interventions when a student is seen as a threat to himself or others or is struggling with a mental health issue. They are also called in by police to help children deal with the loss of a parent in an accident or crime.

What we do first is try and stabilize the situation, she said. That means assessing the student and working with parents to create a plan to do that. It could also mean hospitalization, she said.

In the first three months of this year since school has opened, EMPS has responded to 146 requests for service compared to 89 last year, she said.

Almost 90 percent of those have been stabilized through a series of sessions and visits. She said it can take weeks of work to do. About 6 percent have been hospitalized, with the remaining still undergoing crisis management.

There are lots of things going on with our students. Some are depressed. Some are abused. Some are abusing drugs or alcohol, which can make it harder to stabilize them, she said.

Suicide is a major concern that needs to be taken seriously, she said. Of the 484 youngsters the EMPS saw last year, 45 percent expressed suicidal thoughts and 12 percent made an attempt.

The key is getting people help early and that means friends and family have to be willing to get involved. For teens, friends are especially important.

"A teen will tell friends things they won't tell their parents," she said.

Moving ahead

More than a week ago, a student in Stamford told police about a suicide threat a friend had made. Police immediately went and found the student safe and sound and brought in Child Guidance Services.

Lt. Diedrich Hohn, who leads the Family Services Unit of the Stamford Police Department said School Resource Officers at the high schools are being approached by students worried about friends.

While he couldn't discuss specific cases, he confirmed that police are involved and the SROs have received mental first aid training and continue to receive refresher courses.

Moving ahead, the district is looking for ways to help its students. Expanding services could mean hiring more workers or finding new programs to start. All can carry some costs.

As of now, the district's head of grants said she is unaware of any grant programs to provide funding for new programs.

In the meantime, Perlstein said she hopes people will get involved, especially if they know the programs out there work.

People need to know most students come through this and live productive lives, she said.

"There is never going to be anything that can prevent all tragedies," she said. "But risks can be reduced."